Experienced attorneys are going to come up with a figure estimating the value of your case based on both the range of likely outcomes if the case goes to trial, and some estimate on the likelihood of each of the possible judgment awards.  The experienced attorney will also come up with an estimate of the settlement value of the case, looking at the injuries and trying to determine what the defendant or the defendant's insurance company might be willing to pay in settlement to avoid the cost and uncertainty of a trial. 

While these figures are not exactly guesses, a dozen different attorneys may come with a dozen different figures (though hopefully if the attorneys are all reasonable and know what they are doing the figures will not be too far apart). 

Some contend you can look at various jury verdict reporting guides to find similar cases or can multiply the medical bills and lost wages times 2.5 or 3 and then add in any property damage and come up with the proper settlement figure.  These may be comfortable rules of thumb, but they are also wrong. 

In the case of jury verdict reporting guides, or reported settlement figures, the figures are often grossly misleading, since most settlement figures or jury verdicts are not reported at all.  The only figures reported are the ones attorneys tell the reporting service about.  Since the reporting services are generally geared toward plaintiffs and plaintiff's lawyers, the guides are very unlikely to include the cases settled for $1,000 when the medical bills totaled $10,000, and not many plaintiff's lawyers are likely to call up to boast of the outcome of a jury verdict that gave his client nothing.  The jury verdict reporting guides are virtually worthless in deciding how much your case is worth.

One important thing to keep in mind, though, is that personal injuries are not supposed to make you rich, nor are they intended to serve as lottery tickets.  Personal injury law is simply intended to allow an injured party to be "made whole," financially putting them back in the same position they were before the injury, with recognition of the fact that a crippled persons body can not be made whole by a jury, and scars can not be magically removed by a judgment, time lost during a long period of recovery can not be found, and money will never properly compensate anyone for pain and suffering, but with all of that in mind, all a jury can do is approximate the dollar value of the injury and award the plaintiff a judgment for that amount.
 

Factors 
The value of your case is going to depend on a multitude of factors, including the following: how strong your proof is, how sympathetic you come across as a victim, how credible your witnesses are, what sort of testimony your treating physician provides, what sort of medical history you have, what county your case is brought in, who the judge will be to hear your case, who the claims adjuster and attorney defending the case might be, the amount of your medical bills and lost wages, whether you have an attorney representing you and then who the attorney is, whether you have filed suit, whether there is any scarring or disability rating or other permanent injury, whether you followed all of your doctor's advice and went through with any rehabilitation program, what sort of pain you have had as a result of the injury and how effectively and convincingly you are able to express it, what sort of lost wages you had and whether the injury is likely to effect future earnings, whether jurors identify with or sympathize with the defendant, how your injury has effected your opportunity to enjoy your life, how likely a jury might consider you to be the one at fault or the extent to which a jury might consider you to be at fault. 
 

Types of Damages 
Generally there are three types of damages: medical bills, other economic losses (property damage, lost wages, and any disability), and pain and suffering.  (While punitive damages do exist under Tennessee law, it is very unusual that they would be available and as a result they are explained elsewhere.) 

Medical Bills: 
It may seem that the medical bills are easy to deal with -- you just add them up, right?  Well, not really.  First you should include not only the medical bills from doctors or hospitals or ambulances, but also the cost of any medications, a charge for mileage to get to and from any medical appointments or rehabilitation therapy, and projected costs of future medical care and medications.  Past economic loss is easy to determine. Economic losses include: medical care and related expenses; expenses for over-the-counter or prescription drugs; lost income because of time spent unable to work or undergoing treatment for injuries; additional child care or home maintenance costs; and mileage to and from the hospital. 

But even after you collect all of the information and total the numbers, you have only begun the process.  You also have to prove that the medical care was medically necessary to treat the specific problems you had, and that those problems were that result of your injury caused by the defendant and not from some other injury, and that the charges for the care were reasonable and customary fro the local medical community. 

Anytime the defendant (or the defendant's insurance company or attorney) think you might have been "padding" your medical bills by getting care that was not needed (insurance companies often question any bills from chiropractors) or that your medical bills might be for taking care of health problems unrelated to the defendant.... you are almost certain to need the deposition of one or more of the physicians who treated you. 

And if your injury is going to require future medical care, it becomes even more likely you will need testimony from your doctor before an insurance company will agree to make payments 

Once these matters come into question, it is impossible to assign a meaningful settlement or trial value to the case until you've taken the doctor's deposition.  The doctor's testimony can make or break a case.  The insurance company knows that and they often have high hopes for what their attorney can get the doctor to say during the deposition to hurt your claim, to indicate you are faking your injury, that your injury is actually the result of some other accident, or that you have failed to follow through with treatment recommendations and that your continuing problems are really your own fault for not doing as the doctor advised. 

You can always settle a case before such a deposition is taken, but if you do so it will be at a significantly discounted value of what your case is actually worth, because until the medical deposition is taken and is favorable to you, the insurance company will assume the deposition would hurt your case. 

Other Economic Losses: 
Property damages will generally add to the settlement value or the value of the case at trial dollar for dollar, but even this is misleading as to the effect on the overall trial or settlement value of a case.  The greater the property damages and the more visual the property damages, the easier it is to persuade a claims adjuster or defense attorney or a jury that the personal injury you suffered was real and was related to the accident.  If your car was crushed in the auto accident causing our injury, it is going to be easier to settle, and the claims adjuster is likely to offer more, than if your injury came in a minor fender-bender.... even though the injury to the car is not a clear indication of the injury to the person inside the car.  The property damage aspect of a claim is often settled fairly quickly, while the personal injury part of it may take much longer.  But even when the property damage claim is settled on a dollar for dollar basis (a dollar paid for each dollar of loss), the property damage is still likely to play a major role in determining the value of the claim for personal injury. 

Lost wages also add both a dollar for dollar value to the case (assuming the re are no questions about liability) and can give added weight to your claim of pain and suffering, another economic loss, but one which is much more difficult to prove... and even once it's clearly proven it has become hard to persuade local juries to award meaningful damages for pain and suffering in negligence cases.  (Local juries are much more receptive to awarding damages for pain and suffering in the injuries are the result of an intentional action of the defendant and not just the negligent action of the defendant.  In other words local juries often will require defendants to pay for pain and suffering that the defendant intended to cause, but not for pain and suffering caused accidentally.)  Because the lost wages can give added credibility to the claim of pain and suffering, lost wages may increase both the settlement value and the trial value of a case by far more than the amount of wages lost.  Lost wages can help create something of a multiplier effect, increasing the total value of the case by a percentage ranging from an added 10% to an added 100%. 

Future lost wages should also be included, but they are more difficult to calculate and will frequently require an expert witness.  Loss of future earning capacity is the difference between what the injured person was capable of earning over their lifetime before the accident and the amount they are now capable of earning as a result of the injury.  First a doctor has to determine what permanent physical limitations the injured person will have in walking, standing, lifting, bending or carrying things.  Then a vocational expert determines the jobs the person was capable of doing before the accident based on their education, training and experience and compares that to the jobs the injured person will be able to perform with the permanent limitations the doctor has established. 

While it is very unlikely that future earnings loss will add any "multiplier" value to what your case is worth either in settlement or at trial, permanent disability ratings may.  Juries are more likely to be favorably impressed by a permanent disability rating and to award more in damages as a result... but only if they believe the disability rating and agree that it was actually a result of the accident and not the result of some other injury or the result of the plaintiff failing to follow the doctor's advice on what to do afterwards to help with the recovery. 

If the injured person is going to require future life care expenses to help with day to day living, this is also an element of damages that can be recovered.  It is also a factor likely to persuade juries that damages are appropriate for pain and suffering, in other words to serve as a multiplier to the other damages.  The measure of this loss is based on the opinions of health care professionals and will generally require expert witnesses, and all of the costs associated with an expert witness.  (This is not to discourage anyone from pursuing recovering for future life care expenses, but merely to help explain what is involved.)   Here we are talking about the cost of medical treatment, medication, and any life support systems the injured person needs for the rest of their life. 

Pain & Suffering: 
Juries are also supposed to award damages for pain and suffering, and even for the more generalized loss of enjoyment of life (often referred to as "hedonic damages"), but they seldom award anything for loss of enjoyment of life and increasingly seem to be accepting the insurance industry argument that "into each life some rain must fall" so the plaintiff should not be allowed to recover for "intangible" injuries like pain and suffering.  (Pain and suffering tend to be intangible only when it is someone else's pain and suffering.) 

It is in the area pain and suffering that multipliers actually come into play.  If you can persuade a jury that your pain and suffering was real, was severe, and that your case is one in which they should award damages for pain and suffering, then you may not even really be looking at determining what the case is worth based on any "multiple" of any figure in the case, but simply based on how much jurors believe you should be compensated for having been forced to suffer through the pain resulting from your injury. 
 

Attorney's Fees 
Injured people often want to know if there is any way they can get the defendant or his insurance company to pay for the attorney's fees required to pursue the claim.  After all, if the idea is to make the injured party whole again, they are only whole if they get their attorney's fees paid in addition to the judgment or settlement and not if they have to pay their attorney from a settlement or judgment.  While this makes perfect sense... unfortunately it's not the law.  You are not allowed to recover anything extra to cover your attorney's fees in a personal injury case and it is absolutely pointless to even ask for it.... and larger attorney's fees do not increase the settlement or trial value of a case. 

Trial Costs 
Just as it costs a defendant or a defendant's insurance company a good deal of money to prepare a case for trial and to then try the case, it also costs a plaintiff money to take the matter to trial.  Expert witness fees (including your own doctor, who is likely to charge at least $500 to give his deposition about your injury and treatment), exhibit preparation, medical records, photographs, court reporters and other charges will routinely run more than $5,000 (though this will vary depending on the case) and it's not unusual for the expenses to run more that $50,000. 

Now these are expenses that will come from whatever settlement or judgment you get in the case, and they can seriously reduce the amount money you end up getting.  If you're offered $7,500 before you run up expenses of $5,000, and if you only get $11,000 after running up those expenses.... well, you just lost money in the process, since $7,500 is more than $6,000 that will be left after you deduct expenses from the $11,000 figure... and since the attorney takes his fee from the total settlement or judgment, and not from the amount left after expenses, you would have to get $15,000 at trial in order to break even with the $7,500 settlement offer if it were only to cost $5,000 in expenses to get the case ready.  (Here are the numbers: a settlement of $7,500 before any expenses will net the client $5,000 after the attorney takes a 1/3 contingent fee of $2,500; on an award of $15,000 the attorney will take the 1/3 contingent fee off the top, then the $5,000 in expenses will be paid, leaving the client the same $5,000 the client would have gotten on the initial offer.) 

This is why a plaintiff in a personal injury case and the plaintiff's attorney need to continually re-evaluate the value of a case and the value of settlement.  The case may be worth more to take to trial than it is to settle, but the client could end up with less money after trial, even when the jury awards more in damages.  As the expenses mount, or as further expenses are needed, settlement may become more attractive. 

Attorney's Reputation 
Another important factor in determining the settlement or trial value of a case is the reputation of the plaintiff's attorney, and how he or she handles the case in getting it ready for trial.  Some  attorneys deny that this makes any difference... generally they're attorneys who have no reputations (or who have poor reputations) and don't like to admit that other attorneys may be able to get more from a claims adjuster just by virtue of their name or reputation. 

If you can get Gerry Spence to take your case, do it, even if he wants a larger contingent fee than any other attorney you've talked with.  Now Spence lives in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and its not very easy to get him to take a case because he's in such high demand.  But Spence is a true living legend in terms of his ability to persuade juries to return meaningful damage awards in personal injury cases.  If a claims adjuster or a defense attorney hears his voice on the other end of the phone line to discuss your case.... well, they're going to instantly decide that your case is worth a heck of a lot more money than if some less skilled attorney is on the line talking with them.  I use Spence only as an example.  Other attorneys will have the same effect.  Some attorneys will increase the value of your case not so much because anyone is frightened by their skills with a jury, but because a defense attorney or claims adjuster knows that plaintiff's attorney is one who will actually take cases to trial instead of settling everything, and trials are also expensive for insurance companies. 

If your attorney has a reputation for settling everything, the claims adjuster and defense attorney will know... and they will lower their offer accordingly, knowing that your attorney really isn't a trial lawyer.  As your case nears a trial date the better your attorney has prepared for trial, the more your case will be worth in settlement, because much of this prepartion will be known to the defense and the better prepared your attorney is to try the case, the more insurance companies tend to be willing to offer to settle the claim.  If a case has not been prepared for trial, or has been poorly prepared, the defense attorney will likely know it and settlement offers may actually go down as you approach trial.  (This same sort of thing happens when you try to settle a case yourself without an attorney.  The claims adjuster knows that so long as you have no attorney there is no real prospect for trial and you have no leverage to pressure a settlement.  Trying to negotiate without an attorney is like a union trying to negotiate a new contract when it in unable to strike, or trying to get an unruly young child to do something when the child knows you won't do anything to discipline him or her.  And the longer you wait to get an attorney the more difficult it will be to prepare your case to go to trial, and the harder it will be for you to get a good attorney.  The claims adjuster knows this and it is a major reason the claims adjuster will string you along with assurances that the insurance comapny will make a reasonable settlement offer and will treat you fairly -- keep in mind that the claims adjuster is not paid to give away large sums of the insurance company's money, but is instead paid to help the insurance company hold onto as much money as possible.) 

If you try representing yourself, the claims adjuster will likewise know that you are not likely to be able to take the case to trial, and that the more you delay in getting an attorney the harder it will be to find a good attorney willing to take your case and the harder it will be to properly prepare the case for trial... and the claims adjuster will reduce his offer accordingly.  Studies have shown that simply having an attorney represent you, regardless of the attorney's skills, will increase figure a case settles at by an average of 100% -- having an attorney doubles the settlement value of the average case. 
 

Fault 
Fault is one of the most important factors in determining the value of your case.  If a defense attorney persuades a jury you were in any way or to any degree at fault, then the percentage of fault the jury assigns to you will correspondingly reduce your jury award.  But the jury never gets told this.  They are told merely to determine what a fair figure is for your damages and to then determine to what extent your own fault or inattention or negligence contributed to your injury.  After the jury does so, the court then does the math to reduce the award by the percentage of fault found by the jury. 

Claims adjusters and attorneys know this happens at trial, and the defense attorney will do everything possible to persuade the jury the plaintiff was at fault.  If the jury finds the plaintiff 51% (or more) at fault, the plaintiff gets nothing.  This is a very important factor in determining what a defendant or his insurance company will offer to pay to settle a case, and as facts develop in preparing a case for trial, it can change the perception of fault and the prediction of what a jury is likely to do on the issue.  This is one of the reasons settlement offers are fluid, going up and down depending on what facts are gathered in preparing a case for trial. 
 

Defendant 
Although jurors are never supposed to award more in damages based on the character of the defendant, the reality of life is that this happens, just as jurors will award more (or less) depending on their impression of the plaintiff.  If the defendant is a convicted drug dealer who ran over you when he was in a hurry to make a drug deal... well, your case just became worth a good deal more. 

On the flip side, if the jury likes the defendant in your case or identifies closely with the defendant... that is also likely to hurt your case and effects both its settlement value and trial value. 
 

Formulas & Multiplier Effects 
Recognizing that some attorneys will use a general rule of thumb of "two and a half to three times the combined medical bills and lost wages" as the proper measure of damages in a personal injury case, I still say that there are no formulas for determining how much a case is worth.  If computers could determine the proper measure of damages... we would use computers instead of juries.  But we are talking about human experiences and feelings; something unique to human beings, and very difficult to accurately quantify. 

Often the most important factor is merely how likable the plaintiff is and how much a jury believes the plaintiff.  Is this fair?  No, but fairness has little to do with shaping an attorney's opinion as to what would likely happen if a case went to trial. 
 
You may have heard that insurance companies use a mathematical formula to figure out how much compensation should be paid for personal injury or pain and suffering.  The adjuster multiplies the amount of past economic losses by 1.5 or 2 when the injuries are relatively minor, and up to 5 when the injuries are particularly painful, serious or long-lasting. 

The more painful the injury, the higher the multiplier.  The more invasive and longer-lasting the medical treatment, the higher the multiplier.  The more obvious the medical evidence of the injury, the higher the multiplier.  The longer the recovery period, the higher the multiplier.  The more serious and visible any permanent effect of the injury, the higher the multiplier. 

And it is true that claims adjusters do exactly that, but if all you are going to do is figure out what the claims adjuster would be willing to offer as a maximum settlement figure you, are ignoring what it takes to get the adjuster to make that offer, and you are ignoring trial altogether, leaving the value of the case to be determined simply by the claims adjuster. 

As I stated above, I don't believe it's possible to come up with any meaningful formula to determine the value of a case without looking at far too many factors to plug into any formula capable of comprehension, with each of those many factors being given weights that will vary from case to case depending on the unique fact at hand.  And the one variable not at all susceptible to formulas is simply how well a plaintiff and the plaintiff's witness come across. 
 
 

Another Perspective 
In placing a value on personal injury claim a good lawyer begins with the end in mind -- What would a reasonable jury award as fair and adequate compensation based on the facts and witnesses they would hear.  There really is no set formula or guide, just informed estimates, but below is an article by Nolo Press offering their thoughts on the matter.  Nolo Press encourages people to handle their own personal injury claims and generally is of the opinion that attorneys are thieves and are not needed.  Now, I strongly disagree with this position, and you can click here to see why, but their position is offered below so you can see how those who encourage settling your claims without an attorney suggest you decide what your claim is worth.  I do not offer their advice as my own, and I disagree with much of it, but I present it simply to let you look at it and decide on you own what weight to give it.  (The article is presented below with permission from Nolo Press.) 

In general, a person who is liable for an accident--and therefore his or her liability insurance company--must compensate an injured person for: 

• Medical care and related expenses. 
• Income lost because of the accident, because of time spent unable to work or undergoing treatment for injuries. It doesn't matter whether the injured person has a full-time or part-time job, regular or occasional employment, an hourly wage or salary, or is self-employed. 
• Pain and other physical suffering. 
• Permanent physical disability or disfigurement. 
• Loss of family, social and educational experiences, including missed school or training, vacation or recreation, or a special event. 
• Emotional damages, such as stress, embarrassment, depression or strains on family relationships--for example, the inability to take care of children, anxiety over the effects of an accident on an unborn child, or interference with sexual relations. 
• Damaged property, which occurs most frequently in vehicle accidents (not only to the vehicle itself, but also to its contents). 

The Damages Formula--Demystified

At the beginning of negotiations on a claim, an insurance adjuster adds up the total medical expenses related to the injury. These expenses are referred to as "medical special damages" or simply "specials." That's the base figure the insurance adjuster uses to begin figuring out how much to compensate the injured person for pain, suffering, other non-monetary losses, which are called "general" damages. 

The adjuster multiplies the amount of special damages by 1.5 or 2 when the injuries are relatively minor, and up to 5 when the injuries are particularly painful, serious or long-lasting. The adjuster then adds on any income lost as a result of the injuries. 

That's all there is to the formula. The total--medical specials multiplied by a number between 1.5 and 5, then added to lost income--is the number from which negotiations begin. 

The Deciding Factors: Which End Is Up?

• The more painful the injury, the higher the multiplier. 
• The more invasive and longer-lasting the medical treatment, the higher the multiplier. 
• The more obvious the medical evidence of the injury, the higher the multiplier. 
• The longer the recovery period, the higher the multiplier. 
• The more serious and visible any permanent effect of the injury, the higher the multiplier. 

Example 1: Werner tripped and fell over a hose. At the emergency room, doctors found a small crack in his wrist. The bone required no cast, Werner required no treatment and he lost no time from work. 

Because they found a break, the multiplier in Werner's damages formula would go up from 1.5 times medical specials to perhaps 3 times. But because it involved no treatment, no substantial recovery time and no permanent effects, it probably would not go any higher than that. 

Example 2: Alicia tripped and fell on a broken stair. Her wrist was fractured badly enough to require a cast for six weeks, another four weeks of physical therapy and eight more weeks of only light use before it returned to normal. 

Because the break required a cast and the recovery time was relatively long, the multiplier applied in Alicia's case would probably be about five times medical specials. 

Fault: The Final Frontier

Basically, the other elements in deciding how much your claim is worth boil down to how the insurance company thinks a jury would decide your claim if it wound up in court. And in measuring its chances in court, the insurance company has to figure in the cost of putting up a legal fight, on top of what a jury might award you, compared with the amount your claim could be settled for without going to court. 

The extent each person is at fault is the most important factor affecting how much the insurance company is likely to pay. The damages formula tells you how much your injuries might be worth, but only after you figure in the question of fault do you know how much your claim is actually worth--that is, how much an insurance company will pay you. 

Example: The cracked wrist bone you suffer in a slip and fall results in $1,000 in medical specials, but you suffer no permanent injury. Applying the damages formula to your injuries might result in a figure of between $3,500 and $5,000, depending on all the other factors discussed. 

If your accident was clearly and completely someone else's fault--your car was stopped at a red light when someone ran into you from behind, for example--then your claim is likely to be worth the full amount of the formula total, that is, between $3,500 and $5,000. 

If, on the other hand, the accident was partly your fault, the amount your claim is worth would be reduced by the degree you were to blame--expressed in a "percentage" of fault. So, if you were 25% at fault for the accident, your claim would be reduced by 25% from a $3,500 to $5,000 range to a range of $2,650 to $3,750. 

If it appeared that you were mostly at fault, the value of your claim would be greatly reduced, perhaps to nothing. But more likely, you could get a very small amount, referred to as "nuisance value." 

Determining fault for an accident is not an exact science. But in most claims, both you and the insurance adjuster will at least have a good idea whether the insured person was entirely at fault, you were a little at fault or you were a lot at fault. And whatever that rough percentage of your comparative fault might be--10%, 50%, 75%--is the amount by which the damages formula total will be reduced to arrive at a final figure.